BXBX NOVEL Chapter 145 - 145 Response Terminals
Since Valk could uproot the Viper Astral Lighthouse and expose the Moon Realm rift, William had to assume that the Stranger Lighthouse in Thorn City could be uprooted. As long as there was a possibility of a Moon Realm rift opening in Thorn City, he couldn’t abandon everything here and go to Ava State to look for Remides.
After all, the Void Sovereigns were already targeting him. He suspected that the Lady of Starvation could accurately locate him in Currere through the wound that constantly spread with the rotting curse.
There were no fixed guidance beacons for the teleportation nexuses on the constantly changing sea. Intercontinental Teleportation had always been an insoluble technical problem. Therefore, it was impossible to rely on Teleportation to reach Ava State quickly.
William considered the possibility of flying over using Morph spells. However, even if he set off from White Goose Port in Emerald Province, he was more than 600 nautical miles away from Ava State. He didn’t have any landmarks on the vast sea to determine his direction. Therefore, William had to set sail for Ava State. It would take him at least a month for a return trip.
!!
Considering that he might have to resolve the empire’s military siege in the future, he would have to leave for at least two to three months. Before he left, he had to resolve the security problems of the Blackwater Swamp and Nakuland to a certain extent.
Building a basic magic network based on the Eighth Holy Spirit figurine was one of the methods he had come up with.
“Lord Kane, this way please.”
As Nizemar spoke, she held the lantern in her hand and led William deeper into the dim secret tunnel.
William had previously rebuilt the Church’s armed organization called the Retribution Templar using the Sealing Temple’s structure. At the same time, he handed over the construction of the magic network to this department.
Currently, the secular government of the Blackwater Swamp and the new Holy Spirits Church were under the jurisdiction of Judgment. The Church’s armed department didn’t need to be as secretive as before. However, the headquarters of the Retribution Templar was ultimately set up in Thorn City’s maze-like and complicated sewer system. The reason was inseparable from the construction plan of the magic network.
Spells that had been finished modeling were stored in public spaces. As long as they were within the range of the magic network, people with the authority to use those spells could use them at will. This was the most popular method to make magic universal in the Mage Guild before the Astral Circuit was proposed. William naturally copied the blueprints for these plans.
He pushed open a few trapdoors that had been reinforced by simple sealing spells. A gentle magical crystal ray flowed out, and William was brought to a spacious stone hall by Nizemar.
Stepping into the hall, William’s gaze was naturally attracted by the bloodstains of various shapes on the stone walls.
“This used to be the sacrificial hall of Offa University’s secret Moon Realm parishes. They hung the fur of bleeding animals on the wall and used it as a medium to summon Lunar Monsters to possess their skin to answer their questions. Over time, these bloodstains were left behind,” Nizemar explained when she saw William’s gaze.
Vincent had previously reported that there were many secret societies in the Blackwater Province’s Offa University that secretly worshiped the Moon Realm. Most of the civilian students who participated in those secret societies were lucky enough to pass the awakening ritual. Many of them had reached the end of their magical studies when they obtained the title of Apprentice. If they wanted to take another step forward, it wasn’t something their talent alone could control—that required the Astral Lighthouse to provide them access for them to advance further.
Although the Astral Lighthouse promised that everyone had a chance to advance and be conferred a title and that they would make fair and equal choices, the Astral Council controlled the number of magic chanters from the various factions by controlling the number of advancement spots within the radius of every lighthouse. Therefore, the spots for advancement, even for Apprentice to Expert, were scarce.
No matter how one designed a screening mechanism when it came to rare commodities, they would ultimately fall into the hands of people willing to pay a higher price.
Therefore, to those who could theoretically reach a higher realm but couldn’t see any hope, the Moon Realm became their only path.
“Just animal fur?” William looked at the blood that seemed to outline a human and asked.
“Uh… The sacrifices they choose are indeed getting closer and closer to humans, but they haven’t reached the last step. This is only a mark left behind by a white-maned ape,” Nizemar replied.
The corruption of the Moon Realm didn’t happen overnight. Most Lunar Monsters patiently guided a mortal until they fell into the abyss. Therefore, when William purged Thorn City and the entire Blackwater Swamp of the Moon Realm believers, although it was on an unprecedented scale that filled Thorn City’s dungeons, only a small number of the depraved Moon Realm believers were truly executed.
However, William did not doubt that under the abnormal system of Astral Laws, many people were extremely disillusioned with the current magic system and turned to the Moon Realm to seek strength.
William retracted his gaze from the blood on the wall and looked at the enchantment table in the middle of the hall where the Holy Spirit Disc was placed. A clergyman in a linen robe with slightly white sideburns was busy with the consecration ritual.
This person was the holy imbuer he had previously recruited from another Sealing Temple in the Blackwater Province. With him were more than 20 field personnel who had been abandoned by the Church in the Blackwater Province. The current Retribution Templar was established with them as the backbone.
To make them work for him obediently, William didn’t hesitate to violate his principles and use the activated Eighth Holy Spirit figurines to perform a divine manifestation. This made the Templars, who had sworn to live and die with the entire Sealing Temple, put down their arms and bend their knees to declare their allegiance to the Holy Spirit.
Unfortunately… there weren’t many sensible people in this Sealing Temple.
“How many Type 2 response terminals have been made?” William walked to his side and asked.
Upon hearing William’s voice, the holy imbuer stopped what he was doing. He turned to look at William in disbelief, and his lips trembled slightly as if he was about to say something.
Before he could say the usual things that William called the ‘Eighth Holy Spirit mantras,’ William interrupted him ahead of time and said, “Keep those things in your usual prayers. Answer my question first.”
The other party opened his mouth and froze for a few seconds before saying respectfully, “Lord Kane, there are a total of more than 60.”
As he spoke, he brought a sample from the side and handed it to William.
It was a small disc engraved with an ancient horn pattern. It was about half the size of a palm and was a little heavy. It was plated with a layer of shiny Elementium Silver.
“According to your request, we’ve chosen the pattern of the Kane Horn. It has an austenite core and is mixed with a little magic crystal powder. Its surface is coated with a layer of Elementium Silver, and it has been consecrated through the Holy Spirit Disc.”
The moment the pendant landed in William’s hand, he felt a connection between him and it. He could observe his surroundings through the pendant or use it as a medium to cast spells remotely.
Due to these characteristics, William eventually named them the ‘response terminals.’
William had the idea of leaving behind a large number of response terminals and using them to cast spells remotely to protect Thorn City. However, there was an extremely fatal problem with using the response terminals to cast spells—great distances increased mana consumption.
He estimated that if he used the response terminals to cast spells in Thorn City from the Ava State, it might drain all his mana to release a single Master-level spell.